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The Castle | Year: 1999 Classification: Comedy Directed: - Rob Sitch Actors/Actresses: - Michael Caton - Anne Tenney the BEST sleeper of 1999 Ok, so the video isn't out yet, but I'm one of the few people who actually saw this movie. Poor Miramax, they didn't market it very well, and thats unfortunate for them and for the general public. A hokey, funny, beyond charming story of a man, a family, and their home, which is THEIR castle. He can't understand how he got his home so cheap, soooo its next to an airport runway, and high tension wires are in his back yard. Its all theirs. Until... the airport wants to expand. How will they fight a huge corporation? The BEST movie to come out of Australia in years! I belong to a film symposium class that viewed this movie. Its the only movie of the year that actually got a standing ovation. Typically Broad Aussie Comedy with a Warm Heart Rob Sitch has created a small comic gem in this unpretentious movie about an ordinary man's battle to save his family's home from compulsory annexation by the neighboring airport. Rife with the broad irreverent humor that practically defines the Aussies' national character (think of Paul Hogan's TV show or CROCODILE DUNDEE, or Baz Luhrmann's STRICTLY BALLROOM), the story manages to stay just one step ahead of farce. Though we can hardly take the characters seriously, they're good blokes nonetheless and it's easy to identify with their predicament. Darryl Kerrigan (Michael Caton) is a good-natured family man who lives by simple principles. He values his home & family above all else in life. When the billion dollar corporation that owns the airport tries to oust him from his home, he just knows it isn't right. And he's too ignorant to know what he's up against when he decides to fight. Though chuckles abound throughout the film, real belly laughs are in order when his hapless lawyer (Tiriel Mora) challenges the constitutionality of 'compulsory acquisition' in court. (His legal argument will doubtless soon become a fixture in law schools throughout the English-speaking world.) In fact, the story offers a solid critique of common law just as incisive and nearly as funny as Jonathan Swift's scathingly satirical critique in Gulliver's Travels. And it's expressed so plainly and clearly that anyone should be able to understand it--even poor benighted Darryl Kerrigan, whose command of legal jargon may be slight, yet who knows in his heart when he's right. 3 1/2 stars for this feel-good little comedy with its heart in the right place. Please, please give us the Australian version on DVD!! This is the most wonderful little movie. Like others reviewers, I first saw the Australian version - at its debut at the Melbourne Film Festival - and fell in love with it. I can recite bits of it word for word. But I don't want the Americanized version, and the VHS we brought with us when we moved back to the US won't play here. Give us back our rissoles! Buy The Castle at Amazon.com Buy posters at Allposters.com Jamster - the latest ringtones for your phone!  Search with Walhello on the Internet on The Castle Search with the Priority Search Engine on The Castle This page in other languages: Suomeksi | Nederlands | Deutsch
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